Last week, HM Land Registry set out its ambitions for 2025 and beyond in a strategy it says will deliver better services and create a faster, less stressful property market, centred around the use of data and a push towards digital transformation.
Strategy 2025+ commits to a series of key milestones, including the use of agreed data standards by 2030, and all property information available and instantly accessible online by 2035.
The strategy has been welcomed by digital property platform PEXA, which took Australian property completion online with government backing and is at the forefront of the drive towards digitalisation in England and Wales.
‘HMLR’s Strategy 2025+ shows clear alignment with PEXA’s goal of delivering a fully digital, seamless conveyancing experience’, said PEXA’s group chief officer Krystle Kocik.
“The roadmap for API services, targets for near-instant simple changes, and the emphasis on digital ID and e-signatures reflect exactly the kind of outcomes we’re working toward with lenders and conveyancers.”
The timelines, Kocik added, are sensible and achievable ‘if appropriately phased and resourced’.
“The plans are realistic if backed by continued investment, disciplined API delivery, industry-wide data standards, and strong execution in partnership with the sector.”
But for some, the strategy is light on details – and simply repeats old promises.
‘I will always commend HMLR for their vision but they do run the risk that their periodic strategy statements are always very long on rhetoric, but short on specific measures and commitments’, said David Jabbari, CEO of national conveyancing platform Muve.
“Saying that by 2035 they will have ‘flexible, fully tailored systems and corresponding people support for customers’ does not fill me with confidence.
“The truth is that they have been making the point about digitisation and data standards for a very long time, and the cynic may suppose that their most recent statements are designed to keep up with the government’s consultation on homebuying, rather than risk appearing that they are part of the problem with the homebuying process.”
And, while Jabbari stressed HMLR has ‘done some very good things’ to integrate with law firms and improve interfaces, and he doesn’t support criticism of digitalisation, he believes the organisation ‘has some serious issues over registration delays that constantly undercut their claims to be focused on transformation and speed’.
Marion Silvey, real estate partner with London law firm Spector Constant & Williams, agrees that speeding up transactions should be a priority. ‘Whilst HM Land Registry Strategy 25+ is somewhat lacking in meaningful detail as to how and what changes will exactly be implemented, anything to speed up the process of registrations and applications to Land Registry will no doubt be very gratefully received by the property industry’, she commented.
“So long as the date received remains accurate and applications dealt with correctly, a reduction in timeframes for registrations and other applications could vastly improve day to day timeframe transactions for developers, lenders and buyers.”
HMLR has committed to a greater use of AI to automate and speed up processes, which it promises will be in place by 2030. Peter Ambrose, managing director of The Partnership Property Lawyers, believes this could be achieved more quickly.
He explained:
“We welcome the recognition from Land Registry that the traditional ‘brute-force’ method of employing more people to try and do more, simply will not meet the demands of consumers going forward. Clearly, this is a massive undertaking given the huge amounts of data and represents a significant challenge, but one which is ideally suited to the use of AI, especially given the unstructured nature of the data they hold.
“Having used AI within our business for the last year, we have first-hand experience of the huge benefits when the correct solutions are used. However, given the speed of current technology development, we feel their target date of using AI to speed up processes of 2030 is a little conservative, and would hope that we could see this sooner.”
Nigel Walley, is chair of the Residential Logbook Association, a trade organisation which champions the potential role of residential logbooks in residential property data and is working towards the implementation of all residential property transactions being supported by a regulated logbook.
For him, the strategy ticks off several items on the RLBA’s wish list, ‘particarly the idea that the homeowner should have access and control of their listings’.
He explained:
“This strategy will create a platform that enables logbooks to innovate around a suite of new services. The RLBA has been petitioning government to enable homeowners to access the data held by HMLR about their properties and to upload their own changes to the register via their logbooks.
“Looking at this strategy alongside the MHCLG consultation announcements, there is a strong Governmental shift towards homeowner rights to access data and control of property records. Logbooks are central to delivering this outcome.”
The RLBA’s buying and selling lead Sally Holdway added:
“We are pleased to see this function in the Strategy 2025+ roadmap. It is a crucial shift towards being more homeowner-centric and one that we can support through logbooks. We are really excited to work with HMLR on this, as it is the first step towards being able to fully manage your HMLR account through a logbook.”
HMLR says its strategy is ambitious and represents its most significant transformation in two decades. But for PEXA, there is room to go further.
‘Looking ahead, there’s scope for even greater clarity around API commitments – for example, published service levels, deprecation windows, and an events-based model to enable true real-time updates for market participants’, Kocik said.
“Likewise, we’d welcome clear timelines for moving away from PDF-based processes toward data-driven, schema-validated lodgement. Setting transparent targets for automation rates and turnaround times by case type would also help the market plan confidently.”
Other improvements Kocik would like to see inlcude a continued focus on developer and integrator experience, including realistic sandboxes with synthetic data and conformance testing; a publicly visible data standards roadmap with tracked milestones for title and lodgement models; and regular dashboards showing performance, backlog and automation progress – to demonstrate momentum and build trust.
She concluded:
“These kinds of steps would make it easier for the whole ecosystem to collaborate and innovate together, ultimately creating a faster, simpler experience for everyone involved in property transactions.”
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